The 1990's decade has been marked by a technological revolution driven by the convergence of the data processing industry with the consumer electronics industry. The effect has, in turn, driven technologies which have been known and available but relatively quiescent over the years. A major one of these technologies is the Internet or Web related distribution of documents, media and files. The convergence of the electronic entertainment and consumer industries with data processing exponentially accelerated the demand for wide ranging communication distribution channels and the Web or Internet, which had quietly existed for over a generation as a loose academic and government data distribution facility, reached “critical mass” and commenced a period of phenomenal expansion. With this expansion, businesses and consumers have direct access to all matter of documents, and computer files.
This rapid expansion has brought in hundreds of millions of Web users, many of whom have relatively little computer skills and sophistication. Consequently, it is critical to the continued expansion of the Web that access to the Web be as simple as possible for the unskilled users and transparent to any problems encountered in operations needed to access requested files or documents. This simplicity in interfacing with the Web must be maintained despite the fact that the rapidly expanding demand for Web facilities and resources has strained the communication capacity and resources of the Web. There is a need in network communications and particularly in the Web for implementations to handle repetitive failures to receive requested documents or files efficiently and transparently to the user.